Sunday, April 26, 2009

Gratuitous Video Posting

Family members may be very interested to see the videos of Natalie in the bath! As you can see, she is doing very well on her alphabet letters - though often she knows who "goes with" the letter more than she knows the letter itself :-)


Saturday, April 25, 2009

Monterey Trip

Last weekend, we went to Monterey for our "babymoon" - one of our last weekends together as a family of three (well, four, but the fourth no doubt spent the weekend curled up in Baby Boy Gibbs's crib - meowing happily when her cat-sitter arrived to feed and play with her).

Here's a picture of Natalie in the "Splash Zone" at the Monterey Bay Aquarium on Friday. She loved the giant blocks more than the tiny little fish they had in this section... at first I was worried that this meant she wouldn't be that into the rest of the fish at the Aquarium. No need to worry about *that* though.

Looking out at Monterey Bay from the Aquarium.
On the Otter slide!
Her favorite exhibit was actually Outer Bay. Check out the link for a cool picture - but the exhibit was a little dark for us to try to take pictures, plus it was always crowded with people. It was super-cool though! After our trip to the Aquarium, she now gets really excited to point out "fishies" anywhere she sees them.

Here are Natalie and Tyler at the Dennis the Menace park - designed by the creator of Dennis the Menace. This park was right across the street from our hotel. It would have been even better for a child a little older than Natalie, though we did spend a really fun hour here on Saturday morning.

After the park, Natalie had a spirited lunch in our hotel room. Tyler and I love it when she makes this face! She worked up an appetite for "shawbees" and "beebees" - strawberries and blueberries.

Then Saturday afternoon we tried to go in the hotel's pool, but the pool was absolutely freezing... and the hot tub was too hot... so we walked across the street to the Monterey State Beach. Natalie loved finding rocks and bringing them to me for our collection. We also built sand castles and ran around a fair bit.
Let's be honest - I was 37 weeks pregnant at the time - Tyler did the running around with Natalie :-)
Below, one of the only pictures we'll have of me being pregnant. I prefer to keep the camera trained on my photogenic subject Natalie.

That whole thing Natalie's left leg is resting on? That's her baby brother. He's huge. As am I.

Sunday, our non-sleeper woke up at 4 am and didn't really fall back asleep... so we left Monterey very early (8 am) in order to make it home for a proper nap here at home. On the way back to San Francisco, we drove up Highway 1 for some sightseeing.

We couldn't resist stopping at Pillar Point, our favorite Northern California beach. This is the beach where Tyler asked me to marry him almost four years ago! Natalie has been here a few times.
It was a gorgeous day with a nice low tide. Tyler and Natalie did a tiny bit of tide-pooling while I relaxed. Then it was back home for a nice long nap for Natalie and I! A very fun weekend was had by all (even Reese, who apparently took several nice naps with the cat-sitter - who also happens to be one of the workers at Natalie's daycare)!

Thursday, April 16, 2009

April Showers

Actually, April doesn't normally shower us with rain here in San Francisco - instead the wind picks up (we've had wind of up to 35 mph this week)... But the lack of rain makes for some nice days to venture out and about, if you can stand the wind!

Two weeks ago Natalie and I took advantage of a nice morning to go to the Farmer's Market in San Francisco. We bought a few treats (really delicious brie, kettle corn, etc. - you know, anything BUT produce!) and then we went for a walk along the Embarcadero. We had such fun!

Eating "shawbees" - ie strawberries - outside the Ferry Building.


This past weekend, we had a few friends over for an Easter brunch. Natalie sprouted not one but TWO teeth Saturday night/Sunday morning, and was finally recovered from yet another ear infection - so we were totally sleep-deprived, and having friends over helped distract us!

Maya in the background enjoying Natalie's toy selection...

Todd and Anna Youngs
We had a super-fun Easter egg hunt on our back patio. The girls (Charlotte, Anna, Maya, and Natalie) all lots and lots of fun finding the eggs and opening them to see what was inside.

I am now officially on maternity leave from work, getting ready for Baby Boy Gibbs to appear. Three more weeks until his due date! We have a few little errands to take care of (de-furring his crib, as Reese decided that it was her own personal little haven; adjusting the straps on the infant car seat to fit a little newborn, etc.) but nothing that worries us. In fact, we are so calm about Baby Boy's arrival that we are taking off tomorrow for Monterey for the weekend to celebrate the end of Tyler's tax season. We can't wait!

At 36.5 weeks, Baby Boy Gibbs is estimated to be somewhere around 7+ lbs. already. Medical professionals seem to agree that he is shaping up to be as big as his sister was (she was 8lb 14 oz, and 21.5 inches long). He is very healthy, moving around vigorously - though not too vigorously for Mom, thankfully - and during my ultrasounds he's been sucking on his thumb, practicing his breathing, and just generally being cute. We hope that everything continues so well for the next few weeks.